Have you recently noticed a heightened interest in literature among friends who are otherwise dumb as stumps? Do you have a son or daughter who suddenly thinks reading is cool? You may be surprised to learn that researchers have discovered a highly addictive drug contained in the scent of books.

The drug, dubiously dubbed ‘The Bookworm’ is a hallucinogenic mixture which causes those who inhale it to experience a temporary high followed by an inflated ego, nonsensical rambling, and delusions of grandeur. The most potent strains are found in works such as those by Faulkner, Nietzsche, and Tolstoy, with larger doses being found in larger volumes. The discovery of the drug, a long-held underground secret, is causing quite a stir within the nation.

“I shoulda known it was drugs in there,” says one local man. “All these hipsters runnin’ around in their tweed jackets carryin’ stacks of books, but they…

The serious student of history, like the serious historian, values primary sources. The eye witness reports of people directly involved in an event have an immediacy which the sands of time and the fog of memory only dull. Second only to primary sources are serious scholarly works drawing together primary sources which, due to language or inaccessibility or volume, are beyond the reach of the casual scholar.

Such a work is The Hessians: and the Other German Auxilliaries of Great Britain in the Revolutionary War. Writing a hundred years after the American War of IndependenceEdward J. Lowell gathered many European inputs—treaties, letters, journals and memoirs—to present the perspective of those often unwilling participants whom we collectively call “Hessians.”
Unlike modern writers who casually edit history Continue reading →